Luna's Gift
Copyright© 2025 by Megumi Kashuahara
Chapter 1
The pre-dawn cold bit through the thin walls of my cottage, pulling me from shallow sleep. I had grown used to waking before the sun. It was safer that way, less chance of crossing paths with the others when they were fresh and eager to remind me of my place. The floorboards creaked their familiar morning song as I shifted beneath my threadbare quilt. And for one blessed moment, I existed in that space between sleep and waking where loneliness couldn’t quite reach me.
Then I felt the warmth. My eyes snapped open. There, nestled against my ribs beneath the covers, were two small bodies radiating heat like tiny furnaces. My breath caught. Slowly, carefully, I lifted the edge of the quilt. Two wolf pups blinked up at me with eyes too aware, too ancient for their size. One was slate gray with a white blaze down its muzzle. The other was russet brown with oversized paws that promised future strength. They couldn’t have been more than a few weeks old.
Yet they watched me with an intelligence that made my skin prickle with instinctive recognition. Wolves, not dogs. Actual wolves in my bed. My heart hammered against my ribs as I tried to sit up slowly, but the russet male pup prodded his oversized paw against my breast and gave a low growl of protest. This wasn’t possible. Our territory was protected, warded against wild animals. The only wolves allowed within the compound walls were ... were ... The realization hit me like winter water.
These weren’t wild wolves, these were pack children. Shifter young who hadn’t yet mastered the transformation back to human form. “Oh no,” I whispered, my voice hoarse with sleep and rising panic. “No, no, no, this has to be a mistake.” The gray pup nuzzled against my clothed right breast, making a sound somewhere between a whimper and a purr.
The russet one climbed up inside my nightgown, tiny claws lightly scratching my tender skin. It stopped momentarily, sniffed my vulva, then proceeded to crawl up my belly, smelled my left breast, licked it twice, then latched onto my nipple and began to suckle.
It lay along my left side where it could feel my heartbeat, my pulse beating its terrified rhythm. I was shocked, almost terrified, not knowing what was happening to me. As this tiny pup suckled, my right breast started leaking milk. I was a virgin, never pregnant. I thought, How can this be happening to me?
As the tiny pup fed, a warm, peaceful peace flooded over me. Strangely, for some unknown reason, I no longer felt afraid, but seemed to feel that I was meant to nourish those of my kind as a protective mother. The grey pup, following its sibling, climbed up the inside of my nightgown and copied its brother and after giving my pubis a sniff made its way to my right breast and latched on.
Everyone in the Silvermoon pack knew what this meant, even those who lived on the margins, who were tolerated rather than welcomed. The Luna Trials happened once every few generations, when an Alpha King reached his prime without having claimed a mate.
The king would choose candidates, usually the strongest, the most beautiful, the most connected females in the pack, and his young would be sent to test them. Children knew, even in their wolf form, especially in their wolf form, they knew who had the capacity for nurturing, for protection, for the fierce tenderness that made a true Luna. But they couldn’t have chosen me. There had to be some mistake. I was Étaín, the orphan girl who lived in the forgotten cottage at the edge of the western woods.
My parents had been omegas, the lowest rank, and they died when I was seven, taken by a fever that swept through the pack twelve years ago. I survived because old Ilsa, the healer who had since passed herself, had kept me isolated in my cabin during the worst of it. Since then, I had been invisible, a shadow moving through pack gatherings, serving food at festivals, mending clothes for those who threw me a few coins, growing herbs in my tiny garden to trade for bread and cheese.
My blonde hair, so pale it was almost white in certain light, marked me as different, even among a pack of shifters. My small frame, my quiet voice, my tendency to flinch when anyone moved too quickly near me. These were not the qualities of a Luna. The trials were meant for females like Sienna Redclaw, whose father led the warrior class and whose beauty was legendary, or Vivian Nightshade, whose cunning had won her a place on the Alpha Council despite her youth.
Or even Celeste Frost, whose ice-blue eyes and sharp tongue commanded respect in every room she entered. Not for me, never for me. The pups squirmed inside my nightgown, having suckled their fill and the russet one let out a tiny howl that was probably meant to be fearsome, but came out adorable instead. Despite my earlier panic, I felt my lips curve into a small smile. They were beautiful, these little ones, innocent in a way that adults never were, carrying no prejudice, no awareness of social hierarchy.
“Your father made a mistake,” I told them softly, stroking the gray one’s soft fur. “I’m not. I’m nobody. When the sun rises, I’ll take you back to the Great Hall, and we’ll sort this out. Okay?”
The russet pup growled, actually growled at me, and I recognized the stubborn set of its little jaw. Oh, this one would be trouble when it grew up. A knock at my door froze us all. It was barely dawn. The sky outside my single window still held that deep purple that came before true sunrise. No one came to my cottage. No one ever came to my cottage except the herb merchant once a month, and he wasn’t due for weeks. Another knock. Harder this time.
The pup’s ears flattened against their skulls, and both of them pressed closer to me, trembling. Their fear sparked something primal in my chest, something that pushed past my own terror to create a shelter with my body, curling protectively around them even as I called out, “‘Who’s there?’
“Open the door, girl.” The voice was female. Clipped. Authoritative. I recognized it immediately. Counselor Vivian Nightshade. “The Alpha King sent me to verify the placement was successful.”
My mouth went dry. This was real. This was actually happening. With shaking hands, I wrapped the pups in my quilt and stood, padding barefoot across the cold floor. I cracked the door open, and Vivian’s sharp gaze immediately dropped to the bundle in my arms.
She was beautiful in the way that winter was beautiful. All clean lines and lethal edges. Her dark hair pulled back in a severe knot that accentuated her high cheekbones. She wore the formal black and silver of the council, and her expression revealed nothing.
“So it’s true,” she said, her voice carrying an edge I couldn’t quite interpret. “He actually placed them with you.”
“There’s been a mistake,” I said quickly, the words tumbling over each other. “I’m not ... I shouldn’t be ... Please, I’ll bring them back right now. I never meant...”
“There’s no mistake,” Vivian’s eyes narrowed. “Alpha King Lucian doesn’t make mistakes. He observed all the unmated females during the Harvest Moon gathering last week. He watched how they interacted with the pack children during the autumn games, and he made his choice.” She paused, her gaze raking over me with an intensity that made me want to retreat back into my cottage.
“All three of his choices.”
Three. There were three of us in the trials. “Who are the others?” The question escaped before I could stop it.
“Sienna, Redclaw, and myself,” Vivian said, and something flickered across her face.
Was it resentment? Surprise? The formal announcement will be made at noon in the Great Hall. All three candidates are required to attend with the children they’ve been entrusted with.
“‘Do not be late, Ētane. The Alpha King’s patience has limits.”
She turned to leave, but I called out, “‘Wait!’ When she glanced back, I forced myself to meet her eyes. “‘Why me? I don’t understand why he would choose me?”
For a long moment, Vivian studied me with an expression I couldn’t decipher. Then she said, “‘Perhaps that’s exactly why he chose you. You don’t expect it. You don’t hunger for it.”
Her lips curved in something that wasn’t quite a smile. “Or perhaps he simply wants to see if you’ll run.”
She walked away, her boots crunching on the frost-touched ground, leaving me standing in my doorway with two pups and a future I could never imagined, one that terrified me more than any nightmare. I closed the door and leaned against it, my legs suddenly weak.
The gray pup wiggled free from the quilt and dropped to the floor, immediately beginning to explore the small cottage with nose-to-ground intensity. The russet one remained in my arms, those two old eyes fixed on my face. “What am I going to do?” I whispered to it.
It licked my chin, and despite everything, I laughed, a slightly hysterical sound that echoed in my empty cottage. The sun was rising now, painting the walls with fingers of golden light.
I had six hours until the announcement. Six hours to figure out how to present myself at the Great Hall without dying of humiliation, when everyone saw that the Alpha King had inexplicably included the orphan Omega in his Luna Trials. Six hours to pretend I was someone worthy of standing beside an Alpha King. The pups needed food first, that much was clear. The russet one dropped down and moved to the small kitchen area, pulling out the dried venison I had been saving for winter.
I tore it into tiny pieces, watching as both pups attacked their breakfast with enthusiastic growls that made them sound like the fierce predators they’d someday become. While they ate, I caught my reflection in the small, cloudy mirror above the washbasin. My blonde hair hung in tangles past my shoulders, my nightgown was more patch than original fabric, and my face looked too thin, too pale, too ... ordinary.
There was nothing special about me, nothing that would catch an Alpha King’s attention. Unless Vivienne was right, and that was exactly the point. I had seen Lucian from a distance, of course. Everyone had. He’d taken the leadership five years ago when his father fell in battle against the Shadowfang pack, and at twenty-eight, he commanded respect through sheer presence alone, tall and broad-shouldered, with dark hair that he wore slightly too long and eyes that were said to see through any deception.
He was just, they said. Fair, but unforgiving. Strong enough to hold our territory against all threats. And completely, utterly beyond my reach. The pups finished eating and immediately began wrestling with each other on the floor, tumbling and nipping with joyful abandon. I watched them, feeling that strange, protective warmth bloom in my chest again. They were his children. Lucian’s children. Which meant somewhere in the pack, there was a mother, or mothers, who’d given birth to them. The Alpha King wasn’t mated, but that didn’t mean he was celibate. It wasn’t uncommon for powerful wolves to have children before they chose their Luna. These pups would have been born to strong females who hoped their sons or daughters might be the key to winning the Alpha King’s heart. Instead, he’d taken them and sent them out to find his mate himself, using the oldest test in our culture.
Trust the children. They know truth. They know hearts.
“Why did you pick me?” I asked them softly.
The grey one paused in its wrestling to look at me, head cocked. Then it padded over, climbed into my lap, and curled up with a contented sigh that said more clearly than words, “Because you’re ours.”
The russet one followed, settling against its sibling, and within moments, both were asleep, the instant total sleep of the very young who feel completely safe. I sat there on my cold floor holding two pups who believed I was their mother and felt the weight of impossible expectations settle onto my shoulders like a mantle made of thorns by noon everyone would know.
By noon, I would have to walk through those great hall doors and face not just the Alpha King, but the entire pack who would wonder what madness had possessed their leader to include me in the most important decision of his reign. By noon, my invisible life would end, and whatever came next would either destroy me or forge me into something I could not yet imagine. The pups snored softly in my lap, trusting and warm and utterly unaware of the storm their presence had created.
Outside the sun climbed higher and the morning birds began their songs and somewhere in the great hall an Alpha King waited to see if his gamble on a broken forgotten girl would prove to be wisdom or folly. I had six hours to prepare. It felt like I had no time at all. I spent the next three hours in a state of controlled panic doing everything I could to make myself presentable while the pups alternated between sleeping and exploring every corner of the cottage with relentless curiosity.
The gray one, I’d started calling him Storm in my head, though I had no right to name the Alpha King’s children, had discovered my herb bundles hanging from the ceiling beams, and seemed determined to taste each one. The russet one, who I’d mentally dubbed Ember for the way her fur caught the light, had claimed my only spare blanket as her personal territory and growled at Storm every time he came near it. They were already showing such distinct personalities. Storm was adventurous, fearless, constantly pushing boundaries. Ember was possessive, protective, watchful. And both of them kept returning to me, checking that I was still there, pressing against my legs, or climbing into my lap whenever I sat down. The bond was forming. I could feel it like threads being woven between us, something ancient and instinctive that had nothing to do with logic or social standing.
They’d chosen me on some level that transcended pack hierarchy, and with every passing hour, the connection grew stronger, which made what was coming even more terrifying. I heated water over a small fire and washed as thoroughly as I could, scrubbing away the fear, sweat and the dust of my forgotten cottage. My hair took the longest. It fell nearly to my waist, and I had to work through countless tangles with my broken comb when it was finally clean and dry.
It caught the late morning light streaming through the window, looking almost silver.
“My mother’s hair,” Marjorie used to tell me. “Your mother had hair like moonlight on water. She’d been beautiful.”
My mother. I barely remembered her face anymore, but I remembered her gentleness, the way she would sing while she worked, how safe I had felt in her arms. Would I have made her proud, if she could see me now? Or would she have been horrified that I was being thrust into the Alpha King’s attention?
My wardrobe was pitiful. Three dresses, all of them worn and faded. The best one was a deep forest green that I had been given two years ago by a pack member who’d felt charitable after I had healed her daughter’s persistent cough with the right combination of herbs. It had been fine once, probably, but years of wear had faded it and frayed the hem. It would have to do. I had nothing else. I braided my hair in a simple plait down my back. I didn’t know how to do the elaborate styles the higher-ranking females wore—and splashed my face with cold water one more time, trying to bring some color to my pale cheeks.
When I looked in the mirror again, I saw what I always saw: a girl who looked younger than her nineteen years. Too thin. Too colorless. Too unremarkable. But my eyes, at least, looked clear, determined even. If I was going to face humiliation, I would face it with my spine straight and my head high.
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